Abstract
Purpose :
There are a limited number of case studies evaluating the use of anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) therapies in the treatment of macular telangiectasia associated with choroidal neovascularization (CNV), with the largest having a sample size of six. We performed a retrospective, observational clinical study to assess the efficacy and visual outcomes of anti-VEGF therapies in the treatment of macular telangiectasia associated with CNV.
Methods :
After approval was obtained from Retina Associates of Cleveland institutional review board, electronic medical charts were searched based on international classification of disease codes 9 and 10 for retinal telangiectasia and intravitreal injections, resulting in a total of 101 subjects. After accounting for duplicates, excluding non-macular telangiectasia subjects, and excluding subjects treated for age related macular degeneration, a total of 22 eyes from 20 subjects remained. The gender, age, visual acuity (VA) at diagnosis and at last visit, number and type of intravitreal injection, and duration of follow up were recorded.
Results :
The average age of subjects included were 71 years of age, with 13 out of 20 subjects being female (65%). 8 patients were treated with ranibizumab, 16 with bevacizumab and 3 with aflibercept. The mean numbers of injections were three. The mean follow up was 553 days. The average initial VA was 20/200 and average final VA was 20/100-1. The average improvement in ETDRS letters was 14. Overall, only 1 eye had a decreased in VA from baseline, 5 eyes (23%) had no change in VA, and 11 eyes (50%) had an improvement of ≥10 letters.
Conclusions :
In this study, it appears that anti-VEGF is effective in preserving and improving vision in macular telangiectasia associated with CNV with a limited number of intravitreal injections. A multicenter prospective study would further delineate the role of anti-VEGF therapy in macular telangiectasia associated with CNV.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2016 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Seattle, Wash., May 1-5, 2016.